AROUND THE WORLD.

Festival wants Wagner music dropped

May 12, 2001|By Items compiled from Tribune news services.

JERUSALEM, ISRAEL — Bowing to protests from Holocaust survivors, an Israeli music festival decided Friday to ask conductor Daniel Barenboim to drop music by Hitler's favorite composer, Richard Wagner, from his program at the festival.

Barenboim, music director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, is scheduled to conduct the first act of Wagner's opera "Die Walkuere," with the Berliner Staatskapelle and solo singers July 7 at the Israel Festival in Jerusalem.

There has been an outpouring of protest in Israel over the planned performance, including from Israel's parliament.